But when you give a feast...

by annie

The Powerhouse church was finishing off a week long "outreach crusade" on Saturday, after inviting a guest speaker from Zambia to come preach in a circus-sized tent (pictured above), and inviting everyone they could find in Mamelodi. Pastor Vincent had it in his heart that to finish off the week, we must have a party at which the honored guests would be the blind, crippled, & elderly. It was his birthday this week, and so he jokingly said that could be our excuse; this was how he wanted to spend his birthday. Pastor Vincent asked us to show up early on Saturday to go out and pick up our VIP guests. One house we went to had 3 blind elderly women, and a man using a walker held together with wire, as he has lost one of his legs. When someone wasn't at home, I watched Maria and Jonas (two members of the Powerhouse) explain what we were doing, and why, to the neighbors who came out. Once back inside the van, Maria smiled at me and whispered, "I like to do evangelism. It's good even to tell them why we have come."

Once collected, and at the church, we worshiped and sang, then the pastors laid hands on our guests and prayed for them. Vincent chose people out of the crowd to come up to the podium, encourage our guests and tell them how much we love and honor them. Then, we had a big meal, and cake! I was sitting at a table with 6 gogos (grannies.)

During lunch Allan went looking for a walker he'd seen in a back room covered in dust, someone had shipped from America. He cleaned it up, and from where I was sitting I could see him give it to the man with a broken walker. Such joy! He started checking it out, folding it up, trying his weight on it. He was so happy.

One blind woman was very weak, and needed help to the bathroom. We had to go very slowly, and the whole time we were shuffling along together I was thinking, "What do I do when we get there?? What's cultural protocol in this situation?" I had no idea. Whatsoever. I know it's a strange analogy, but to me, this walk was a picture from God of what my faith must be. This woman was weak, and needed me. I'm the one who saw her trying to stand up, and I needed to go and help her. She needed to do something I had no idea how to help her do, but I just had to get her there. And when we got there, a wonderful, older lady from the church was at the sink, and she took this woman's other arm, and led us through what we needed to do. As so many of you who are mothers, teachers, social workers, construction workers, Sunday school leaders...
already know, God doesn't often give us tidy jobs to do! And he often waits until the moment something is needed, before he brings it into the picture--be it a person with gifts you don't have, a situation that provides you with rest, a voice speaking encouragement, or an understanding of what's expected of you. Our eyes and ears must be open.

When Allan and Jonas drove the guests home, David, the man with the walker asked if he could be dropped off last. Apparently, he leaves his home very rarely, and rides in a car even less often. As he extended the ride as long as he could, Allan watched David in the rear view mirror, alone in the backseat, staring out the window, purest joy on his face.

"When you give a dinner or a banquet, do not invite your friends or your brothers or your relatives or rich neighbors, lest they also invite you in return and you be repaid. But when you give a feast, invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, the blind, and you will be blessed because they cannot repay you. For you will be repaid at the resurrection of the just." Luke 14:12-14

This Powerhouse church can be so literal, so impractical. What a joy to learn from them in fellowship.